The Revolution Will Not Be Televised

“The Revolution Will Not Be Televised” is in free verse, a poem with no regular rhyme or meter, and comprises 10 stanzas loosely organized around vivid images designed to show what the revolution is not. The first stanza is a direct address to a complacent Black reader, while the second, third, seventh, and ninth stanzas are lists of commercial and pop culture references. The fourth, fifth, sixth, and last two lines of the seventh stanzas are images of Black urban identity, with all but the last two lines of the seventh stanza reflecting highly stereotyped representations of Black Americans. The fourth and eight stanzas also include references to current event programs, also sources of highly stereotyped notions of the United States and Black Americans in particular. The final stanza returns to a direct address to the complacent Black reader and makes a call to action to convince the reader to engage in activism. Although there is no rhyme scheme, Scott-Heron ties the poem together thematically through repetition of lines, such as “The revolution will note be televised” (Lines 5, 12, 18, 24, 39, 46, 54, 55).